Tuesday's broadcast of Fox News Channel's "Special Report" featured a segment about the changing landscape of college athletics with the NIL market and the transfer portal, which featured U.S. Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Auburn) and Auburn head basketball coach Bruce Pearl.
While Tuberville discussed his legislative fix, Pearl acknowledged that student-athletes are being compensated for their worth. However, he said it comes at a cost for college athletics.
Partial transcript as follows:
"SPECIAL REPORT" HOST BRET BAIER: In July 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the NCAA could not prevent student athletes from profiting off their name, image, and likeness.
Now, four years since that decision, the NIL market is expected to be worth around $1.7 billion. More than $1 billion of that is going to college football. Men's basketball is worth around $389 million. Women's basketball players receive about $75 million. Olympic athletes are generating more than $134 million.
The payments can come in a variety of ways.
Tonight, we take a look at the NIL landscape and the push to create a nationwide policy.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
BAIER: The NCAA first passed overarching NIL policy in 2021. It allowed athletes to receive payments if they followed state laws. The rules also attempted to prevent schools from using NIL money to recruit athletes.
What did recruiting athletes look like before NIL?
SEN. TOMMY TUBERVILLE, (R-AL): It was a lot easier. There is really no recruiting now. It's buying. If I bought one an ice cream cold I would get brought down by the NCAA.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you ready? Let's do it, man.
BAIER: But as more and more states enacted laws, recruitment became a part of the rules.
TUBERVILLE: In football and basketball, it's whoever has got the most money.
BAIER: Republican Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville coached football at Ole Miss, Auburn, and Texas Tech before being elected to Congress. He has co- sponsored NIL legislation alongside independent West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin. He plans to reintroduce or modify the Protecting Athletes Schools and Sports, or PASS Act, alongside a Democrat in the next Congress.
TUBERVILLE: Over the years, the money has gotten higher and higher and the student athletes are going, wait a minute, why don't we get some of that money? Why don't we share in the revenue? And that's what's coming.
BAIER: Which led to those legal actions. How would the PASS Act address some of this?
TUBERVILLE: Well, there's all kinds of problems in it right now. Number one, you have the collectives.
BAIER: Collectives are made up of boosters, individual donors, and businesses. The groups are estimated to control around 80 percent of the NIL market.
ROB SINE, BLUEPRINT SPORTS: And I don't think the federal government is the way to do it. I think it creates a whole lot more complications.
BAIER: Collectives arrange for athletes to be paid through endorsements, public appearances, or social media posts.
SINE: The NCAA is the reason collectives exist because of the interim policy that was put together that really didn't have a lot of guardrails.
BAIER: Blueprint Sports oversees a number of high-profile collectives across the country, including schools such as N.C. State, Maryland, and Arkansas.
SINE: The schools want to take more control over it, so what it does is it turns us into internal NIL agency that schools are hiring to run all the operations and all this.
BAIER: There's a lot of people who look at NIL and they say there's two sides here. One, they are concerned about what it means for the sport, college sports overall and whether it hurts it in the big picture. And two, they understand that kids, maybe they need to make though money. And it just seems like it's messy right now.
BRUCE PEARL, AUBURN MEN'S BASKETBALL COACH: Well, you know, Bret, this is a free market economy. We live in the greatest country in the world. And I think it's great that our student athletes are now finally being able to be compensated for what they are worth.
BAIER: Auburn men's basketball coach Bruce Pearl believes national standards are need for college sports.
PEARL: Every coach needs to know that when that ball gets tipped off, we are all playing by the same rules. And right now, we're not.
BAIER: Initial NCAA guidance in 2021 prevented third party boosters from recruiting on behalf of a school. States like Alabama and South Carolina enacted laws around that time reflecting the NCAA guidance.
Has NIL money helped recruiting efforts?
PEARL: It changed recruiting efforts. It's become way more transactional. What is my market value? How much will I get if I go to that school?
TUBERVILLE: Some schools are running it through the university and letting them through the coaches go out and say listen, I will give you $1 million, you come here and play quarterback for us.
BAIER: As some states began to circumvent the recruiting rules, the NCAA shifted its stance. In 2022 the Division One board of directors clarified that schools could request donors provide funds to collectives as long as those were not directed to a specific sport or athlete. The move prompted Alabama and South Carolina to repeal NIL laws after determining other states had more opportunities to recruit better players.
PEARL: It did give us a little bit more freedom, like for conferences and the people that are guiding our program to be able to be empowered. Right now, everything goes to the courts. They lose every lawsuit.
BAIER: Texas passed its legislation in 2023. It strayed from NCAA guidance in allowing donations for specific sports. It also permits perks and benefits for fans who donate to NIL collectives. A clause also made it illegal for the NCAA to punish a school taking full advantage of NIL. Nationwide, athletes are pursuing other money making strategies.
The other thing is this transfer portal system, and how the NIL interacts with that. When you have a kid that can jump a number of times, that's tough for you as a coach. It's tough for a school, but sometimes it's tough for the teams.
PEARL: Graduation rates have been destroyed because the combination of NIL and transfer portal working together.
TUBERVILLE: You can play at five different schools during your career. You can transfer every year to get a degree. Now, the problem --
BAIER: To get a better deal.
TUBERVILLE: Yes, to get a better deal, that's right. Marshall University's football team, almost every one of them transferred. They had to drop out of a bowl game because they were playing in a bowl game here in a couple weeks, because their coach left, and they followed him. And so Marshall lost their bowl game and they had to put somebody else in the bowl.
PEARL: Understand families being in a situation where they may never make more money than they are making right now, and so that's what they are being guided by. And so we are teaching kids to flee, not fight.
BAIER: The transfer portal is allowing seasoned student athletes to basically shop around. UNLV quarterback Matthew Sluka announced in September he would enter the transfer portal for a second time in his college career. Sluka's agent says a $100,000 NIL payment was never fulfilled after his transfer to UNLV.
But what if you put a cap on the number of jumps you could do, like in the portal, just one or something like that?
TUBERVILLE: I agree, 2,000 of these young people just signed up for the transfer portal in the last two weeks because it opened up, 2,000 athletes.
BAIER: State laws differ on who can represent student athletes. In 2019, the Uniform Law Commission recommended states adopt the Uniform Athletes Agents Act. It allowed student athletes to hire agents with the intent of protecting them from unfair practices. At least 39 states have adopted the law, but it has no mention of NIL.
TUBERVILLE: Players have agents. They have lawyers. They had accountants. That's what we fought against for many, many years. Don't sign with agents. Keep them out of your life. But college football, college sports has grown.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
BAIER (on camera): The NCAA will now allow universities to pay players directly in addition to what they are already receiving through scholarships and third-party payments. The schools can pay athletes up to $20.5 million across all sports. Schools are already directing most of that money to football programs. Georgia is expected to spend the most on its program.
Jeff Poor is the editor in chief of 1819 News and host of "The Jeff Poor Show," heard Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-noon on Mobile's FM Talk 106.5. To connect or comment, email jeff.poor@1819News.com or follow him on X @jeff_poor.
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